U.S. Supreme Court Declines to Review Cases Alleging Racial Bias in Oklahoma Death Penalty

The United States Supreme Court has declined to review chal­lenges brought by two Oklahoma death-row pris­on­ers who alleged that their death sen­tences were the uncon­sti­tu­tion­al prod­uct of racial bias. Julius Jones and Tremane Wood had sought to over­turn their death sen­tences based on the find­ings of a 2017 study that showed sig­nif­i­cant racial dis­par­i­ties in Oklahoma’s death sen­tenc­ing prac­tices. On January 22, 2019, the Court denied the peti­tions for writ of cer­tio­rari after hav­ing resched­uled con­sid­er­a­tion of Jones​’s (pic­tured, left) and Wood​’s (pic­tured, right) cas­es 25 times each.

In their peti­tions for cer­tio­rari, Jones and Wood relied upon a sta­tis­ti­cal study of Oklahoma death sen­tences imposed between 1990 and 2012 to argue that racial bias uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly infect­ed their death sen­tences. In 2017, the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission released a report on the state’s admin­is­tra­tion of the death penal­ty that includ­ed the find­ings of Dr. Glenn L. Pierce and pro­fes­sors Michael L. Radelet and Susan Sharp about the impact of race on death sen­tences. The study found that a mur­der defen­dant in Oklahoma accused of killing a white vic­tim was more than twice as like­ly to be sen­tenced to death than a defen­dant accused of mur­der­ing a non­white vic­tim. In cas­es like Jones’s and Wood’s, which involved only male vic­tims, the study found that death sen­tences were near­ly three times more like­ly to be imposed if the vic­tim was white than if the vic­tim was a per­son of col­or. It also found that when the vic­tim was a white male, defen­dants of col­or, like Jones and Wood, were twice as like­ly as a white defen­dant to be sen­tenced to death.

Jones and Wood described oth­er evi­dence that racial bias affect­ed deci­sion­mak­ers in their cas­es. The judge who presided over Wood’s tri­al has made open­ly racist remarks, say­ing in 2011 that Mexicans are ​“noth­ing but filthy ani­mals.” Jones was sen­tenced to death by a near­ly all-white jury, fol­low­ing what his cur­rent lawyers describe as ​“per­va­sive and high­ly racial­ized pre-tri­al media cov­er­age” and ​“racial­ized remarks made by pros­e­cu­tors and at least one juror” dur­ing his tri­al. Dale Baich, one of Jones’s appel­late lawyers, told The Oklahoman, that the facts of the case ​“vivid­ly show how racial bias can lead to a wrong­ful con­vic­tion.” Jones is sched­uled to file a sep­a­rate peti­tion for cer­tio­rari on January 28 rais­ing the issue that one of the jurors in the case said ​“they should just take the n****r out and shoot him behind the jail.”

Both Jones and Wood were pros­e­cut­ed in Oklahoma County dur­ing the admin­is­tra­tion of District Attorney ​“Cowboy” Bob Macy. Macy sent 54 pris­on­ers to death row dur­ing a 21-year tenure marred by alle­ga­tions of exten­sive mis­con­duct. In 2013, Oklahoma County was one of the 2% of coun­ties in the U.S. respon­si­ble for more than half of exe­cu­tions since 1976.

(Perris Jones, US Supreme Court denies Julius Jones’ peti­tion indi­cat­ing racial bias, KOCO, January 22, 2019; Justin Wingerter, Supreme Court declines to review alleged racial bias in Oklahoma’s death penal­ty, The Oklahoman, January 23, 2019.) See U.S. Supreme Court and Race.